Big Mountain, a Struggle in Arizona & its Relationship with Longest Walk 1978

The name, Big Mountain, was applied to a location in the middle of Black Mesa in northern Arizona by the U.S.G.S in the 1930s when it published their official map of the area. To the Dineh (Navajos) of the local region, they have known this location as Dzil'ni't'saa', and which has a summit peak of 7,000 ft. The immediate and most simple translation is, Great Mountain. It means the place of great strength and according to the old stories that were passed down through oral history, the mountain itself and its surrounding area provides healing herbs and natural spring water. Thus, this flat shield-like plateau or a giant shallow mound is 'the great strength' (Dziili') that also refers to healing place and healing power.

Today, more than 350 Dineh residents defy a U.S. Public Law to relocate and immediately accept the benefits and a new modern house elsewhere like 200 miles away in a strange land. These traditional resisters were in solidarity with the Longest Walk of 1978 because they shared the same visions that, indigenous nations must unite in order to survive with their cultures, their coming generations and their lands. The Longest Walk of 1978 generated an enormous awareness about the Red Peoples' (indigenous America) existence and struggle for survival. This spiritual educational Walk of 1978 and with the Big Mountain Elders' participation brought focus to Big Mountain about the human rights violations and religious intolerance that were committed by the U.S. Justice Department and the Department of the Interior Bureau of Indian Affairs.

How the Mountain made them stay:

Public Law 93-531 which is also known as the Navajo-Hopi Land Settlement Act of 1974 began its enforcement of partition boundary fencing and registering traditional families to accept relocation benefits and immediately move out. The traditional matriarchs some whom were healers and along with other local traditional medicine men said that it would be a horrible idea to abandon the sacred place, Dzil'ni't'saa. They all believe that the world and all things on and around Big Mountain would go extinct if the Dineh left. If it was cleared of human beings like the Dineh the deity, Bi'gohchidii (name for the Deity associated to floras and faunas), would no longer give life to Its children and Its vegetation. Natural life would end.

Their fight which were conducted through physical resistance and often there were violent confrontations with federal and tribal police. The boundary fencing stopped, those who were wishing to relocate were intervened by the resisters to reconsider, and Navajo tribal officials tried to negotiate and mediate between the Feds and the local resistance. After the Longest Walk of 1978, some of the young Dineh Walkers went to Big Mountain to assist the traditional resistance. This began the Big Mountain Survival Camp which was an inspired idea from the AIM Survival Schools and the youths acquired this idea during the Longest Walk 1978.

John and Zonnie Katenay, an elder couple, provided their home and resources to help the youth start up the survival camp. Eventually, in 1981 and with other key elder leaders' approval like Kii Shey and Katherine Smith, the Survival Camp was built in the wooded areas in southern Big Mountain. Local coordinator, Bahe (Kat) Katenay, suggested the Camp location due to its strategic location for radio transmission, fuel resources and potential area for sinking a well. 1981 was also the year that the Feds declared that the BIA take complete jurisdiction of the partitioned areas and to restrict all homestead improvements or any types of new construction. Part of the Dineh response to this Fed strategy was to build the Survival Camp compounds.

The Big Mountain Proclamation of Independence 1979 & the Resistance Outpost:

The resistance gatherings throughout 1977 and 1979 produced a declaration signing by 65 local traditional Dineh elders. These signers declared that Big Mountain area (approx. 450,000 acres) as a sovereign country based on the Treaty of 1868 and based on the supreme holiness of the Sacred Mountain Soil Bundle. The Survival Camp would play a major role for the initiatives of the proclamation. It would be the resistance outpost to be maintained by mostly Dineh youths of the Longest Walk 1978. Its key objectives would be to disrupt federal jurisdictional activities related to relocation, fencing, livestock reduction, and surveillence. These objectives would be conducted non-violently according to Elders directives. Additional objectives were to create supporter-network systems on behalf of the elder resisters and facilitate general assemblies for meetings, schools, ceremonies, and other future complexes for elder-care. The Camp's existence (1981-1993) had one of the largest impact for this indigenous resistance to oppression and genocide.

Federal Marshals and the FBI falsely concluded that "this Camp was for militant purposes, and if there were ever to be an armed stand-off and compare that to the Wounded Knee seige of 1973, Wounded Knee would be nothing but peanuts."

Unfortunately, the Feds and the BIA Agency through manipulations and undermining assisted Navajo tribal officials to coerced a few local Dineh to disband the Survival Camp in 1991. The feds and the BIA tribe won majority of the peoples' approval by using the deception that some partitioned lands will be exchanged. Also, the underminings had created much dissension among the resistance that the Camp's merits were being questioned. Longest Walk 1978 participant and local custodian, Bahe Katenay, tried to keep the spirit of the Survival Camp alive but was soon overcome by the backlashes and he seek other alternative means to maintain the Dineh resistance. The last stand at the Survival Camp was the Sun Dance of July 1996 when again federal and Indian police disrupted the attempted re-occupation of the Survival Camp and the reinstatement of Dineh sovereignty.

©Sheep Dog Nation Rocks, 2008